Figuring out Halloween
by LakuriaSyaoran
Summary: Its around Halloween time, so, short AU story in which Serah and Noel carve pumpkins 3


Hey, This is the first time story I've written that I have ever published to the internet o.o It was inspired by the "Imagine your OTP" blog on Tumblr, and I will probably start writing more from that. Anyways~ I hope you like it, feel free to leave me feed back 3

~Imagine your OTP carving pumpkins together for Halloween~

Figuring out Halloween

"Hey Noel, are you excited for Halloween?" Serah asked, looking up at him in her normal rather cheerful-looking manner. They had been wandering the streets rather aimlessly, looking for something to do. Without anymore paradoxes to fix, and Serah safe, things had slowed down a lot and had gotten back to "normal" If you could call their lives that. This was probably one of the first times Serah had spoken up in a while.

Noel glanced over at her "Halloween…?" His voice conveyed a bit of confusion. "I've never heard of it before."

"R-really?" Serah said, rather shocked. More so then she probably should have been, considering she of all people knew how little Noel knew about things in her time.

"Yes really Serah." He replied practically rolling his eyes at her reaction.

"It's a holiday!" Serah said rather excitedly. "On the last day of this month." Serah looked up at the sky. She moved her index finger to her lips, thinking about how to explain Halloween to Noel. "I don't think you really need to know the history behind it right now, basically, people dress up in costumes, and children go from house to house and get candy. It's supposed to be a really scary holiday, but I try and stay away from haunted houses and things…" Serah's became a little unsettled, remembering past Halloweens when she was younger. "I don't like scary things much… but the rest is fun!"

"Sounds…strange." Noel said. "Does everyone participate in this?"

"Well, almost everyone, yeah. There are always some people that are just party poopers."

"Are you going to this year?"

"Well of course! And I think you should too, it could be really fun~"

"I don't know Serah…"

"Well, I guess you don't have to decide right now, I still think you should. What are you going to do otherwise? Stay at home by yourself?" Serah smiled mischievously at him. She knew how much Noel hated to be alone, even if it was just for a little while.

"Serah…" Noel said disapprovingly.

Serah just smiled and continued walking, then another idea popped into her head. "Hey! I know something we can do today!" She said, and grabbed onto Noel's hand. She started to pull him to walk faster.

Noel chuckled and just went along with it. "You're rather excitable today, where are we going?"

Serah didn't answer him, she was scanning around the buildings looking for a certain type of store she knew had to be around here somewhere.

Once Serah spotted a grocery store, she dragged Noel inside and started looking around again. She let go of his hand, but stayed close to him.

"Serah, can you please tell me what's going on?" Noel asked again. He was getting increasingly more confused.

Then Serah went and darted off. "Hey, wait! Serah!" Noel called to her. Luckily he was able to keep up. Serah had found what she was looking for, a very large bin filled with pumpkins.

"This is why we're here!" Serah said, picking one up and smiling at Noel.

Noel raised a brow at her, and waited for her to explain.

"They're called pumpkins. We're going to carve them! It's a way to decorate for Halloween, and it's just really fun." She set the example pumpkin down, and started looking around at all of them.

"Whatever you say Serah… what are you looking for? They all look the same."

"They don't look the same if you look closer. You have to pick one that looks interesting!" Serah smiled.

Noel was starting to smile more, even though he was still confused beyond reason… but Serah seemed so happy and excited, so he couldn't help it.

Not that long after, Serah picked up a pumpkin that she seemed pleased with. "You see one you like Noel?"

Noel had just been staring rather blankly at the sea of orange orbs that was this pumpkin bin, still not really seeing a difference. "Serah why don't you pick one for me? With my luck I'd pick a bad one." He answered, smiling back at his girlfriend.

Serah nodded. "Alright, fine." She said, leaning over to look again. Noel stepped over to her side, and lightly held onto her waist. "Careful, don't want you falling in."

Serah giggled, glancing back up at him. "You're right; I don't want them to eat me."

Noel's grip on her waist immediately tightened.

Serah then started to laugh. "Noel I'm joking!" She lifted another one out of the bin and still laughing at him. "They're plants silly, not monsters!"

Noel let her go and glanced away rather embarrassed. "Ready to go now?"

Serah handed the pumpkin to him and nodded. "Yup! We need to get these, and then we can go home~"

Once they made their way home, Serah and Noel set the pumpkins on the table.

"Just wait here, I'll get newspaper, and other things we'll need." She said happily. She soon returned with a bunch of news paper, and basically threw it on the floor, then walked back to get other things.

"You sure you don't need help?" He asked, chuckling at Serah's rather careless throwing of the news papers.

"Not really, there isn't that much we need." She returned with a big trash bowl, and a few rather big knives, spoons, and a few pens. She set them down on the floor as well, then started to actually lay out the news paper on the floor.

" So… What are we doing exactly? I'm still confused." He asked, moving to sit on the floor with her.

"We're going to carve the pumpkins, and make them into jack-o-lanterns." Serah put the pumpkins on the floor on top of the news paper, and sat by it. "We need to hollow them out, and then we're going to draw a face, or something, on one side, cut that out, and then put a candle on the inside. They look really cool in the dark."

"Hhhmm. Sounds interesting." Noel smiled and then examined the pumpkin for himself. "So I just cut a whole in it to get the insides out?"

Serah nodded. "Yeah basically. It's best to do it from the top though." She took one of the pens, and drew a circle around the stem where she wanted to cut. Serah took one of the knives, and stabbed into the line.

Noel watched her closely, half because he needed the direction, and half because it was Serah, with a big knife, and that wasn't very safe. He soon copied her however. He pulled the top off the pumpkin and lifted it up. He looked rather confused at the mess of strings and seeds that came off with the top piece.. Serah was still cutting her own, it was a lot harder for her considering she wasn't as strong as Noel.

"Now you just need to hollow it out, just spoon out the yucky strings and the seeds." She said, glancing over at him. Serah had leaned over and was going to hand him one of the spoons… but soon enough he had reached his hand in and pulled out a handful of the pumpkin innards, and was now examining them curiously.

Serah squealed in disgust. "Eeewww! Noel how can you do that? The insides feel so nasty!" She covered her mouth both in reaction to how disgusted she was, but also she was trying very hard not to laugh at him.

"It isn't that bad Serah." He smiled at her. "What do I do with them through? I don't particularly want to hold all of them."

Serah let out a small laugh. "You put them in that bowl." She pointed to it. "And you can use this spoon if you want, you don't have to take it out by hand."

Noel shook his head. "It will be easier for me to do it this way." He smiled and continued to scoop out the pumpkin insides with his hands.

Serah started to do the same, but she was doing so with a spoon. She, unlike Noel did not like touching the slimy insides of the pumpkin, and was almost flailing about when they came in contact with her hand.

Noel looked over at her and laughed. "You ok Serah?"

"Yeah, I just don't like this part, it feels so nasty! I don't see how you're just scooping it out with your bare hands!" She said while practically flinging a spoon full into the bowl so she wouldn't have to touch it.

"Serah, I'm used to having to gut and clean creatures to eat, this isn't bad at all." He laughed lightly. "Want me to help you?"

Serah glanced at the pumpkin, and Noel, rater embarrassedly. "N-no, I can do it…. Just stop laughing at me!"

"I'm not trying too…" Noel answered a little defensively. "You're being kinda cute and I can't help it."

Once they both cleaned out there pumpkins, Serah sat and stared at hers, trying to think of ideas on what to make it into. Noel had decided to get and go wash his hands since they were covered in pumpkin goop.

"If you stop staring at it is it going to run away or something?" Noel said when he returned. He was obviously joking the way he was smiling at her.

Serah laughed. "No, I'm just thinking. I don't know what I want to put on it!"

Noel shrugged. "You said earlier it was going to be a face."

She shook her head. "It doesn't have to be, that's just what a traditional jack-o-lantern is. People carve all sorts of things onto pumpkins."

"Hmm…" Noel glanced at her, then around the room. "You really like cats, why not make it have a cat face or something?"

Serah was rather surprised that Noel actually gave her a good idea. "Maybe, I don't know if I can draw a cat though. I'm not a good artist."

Noel shrugged again, trying to think of an idea for himself. "I'm sure you'd do fine. It's not like it has to be perfect."

"I know… but I don't want it to look deformed…" Serah said flipping one of the pens around in her fingers.

Noel decided that instead of planning, he would just start doodling on the pumpkin and see what became of it. It wasn't like he was much of an artist either. However, he was in no way worried about that.

Once Serah had drawn some sort of cat-shape, she glanced over at Noel to see what he was doing. She set her pen down, and crawled behind him, leaning her chin on his shoulder. "What are you drawing?"

Noel glanced over at her out of the corner of his eye. "I don't know. I've just been making lines. I tried to make a face, and it turned into this." He shrugged. It was a rather cool looking design actually.

Serah leaned up and kissed his cheek. "Well whatever it is it looks pretty cool, just be careful cutting it out!" Serah then crawled back over to her pumpkin. She started to cut her cat-shape out, rather carefully.

"I'm more worried about you being careful, don't hurt yourself with the knife…"

Serah sighed. "Geeze, both you and Lightning. I'm not a child."

"No, you're not. But you're easily frustrated." Noel looked at her rather accusingly. "And that's when you become less careful."

"I'll be fine Noel, You worry too much."

He sighed and started to cut out his own design, still glancing up at Serah occasionally to make sure she was still ok.

Once they were both done Serah got up to get a few candles, and Noel retrieved a lighter. They put the lit candles in the pumpkins and then switched off the lights to look at them.

"See? Pretty cool huh?" She asked, leaning her head against Noel's arm.

"Yeah, but what do we do with them now?"

"Put them outside as decoration." She answered, smiling up at him.

"Alright." He answered, but leaned down to give her a kiss. Serah kissed him back, then carried the pumpkins outside. Noel helped her carry them, but he left her place them where she wanted.

"There, now we've at least decorated a little." Serah said happily.

Noel nodded, still not entirely convinced he wanted to participate in this whole Halloween thing. "That good?"

Serah nodded. "For now yes." She giggled a little mischievously.

Noel shook his head. "What have I gotten myself into."


End file.
